


second chance at saving you

by hulklinging



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Reunions, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-16
Packaged: 2018-12-03 00:09:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11520411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hulklinging/pseuds/hulklinging
Summary: Just when he thinks that he's about to die, Magnus sees a familiar face.





	second chance at saving you

**Author's Note:**

> I couldn't help it, I just had to do some zombie stuff.
> 
> Also, the idea of something lich-like existing in a zombie apocalypse? One I touched on here, and now I can't stop thinking about it. So this may end up part of a series.

It’s not a surprise that she’s here, at the end.

‘Here’ is the only word he can really use to describe it - he’s not sure where exactly he is, only that there’s woods in every direction, he’s turned around enough to have lost the highway, and between the trees moves a hoard. It’s got to be thirty of them at least, and they’re slow but relentless, and even his strength has limits.

He’s taken out ten already, but it’s too many and there’s nowhere to run. When he feels something grab at the back of his neck, all he can feel is a quiet acceptance, and underneath that relief. Julia had asked him to fight, to not give up, to do what he could. And he had. The truck he had been travelling in had probably already made it to the city by now, where the rest of his group could find somewhere to hole up for a while. He hoped they didn’t wait for him long. Taako would understand (Taako knows what losing people looks like, in the shambles of this world). He’d make sure they didn’t stay for long, waiting for someone who was never going to show.

And that was familiar, and that was fine. Hurley and Sloane, lost in another hoard, their car disappearing and never returning. Angus’s grandfather, who left to collect food and never returned. Lup. They would wait, no longer than 24 hours, because that was the rule. And then they would mourn and move on.

He’s glad it worked, jumping off the bed of the truck, making every one of the zombies attempting to board turn and follow him instead. It was stupid, they all made sure to shout that at him as he did it, but the rest of them were safe. That’s what mattered.

The hand on his shoulder tightens, and he closes his eyes.

It’s no surprise, that his wife is here with him. What is a surprise is how he feels lips tickle his ear, hears a voice he hasn’t heard in almost a year whisper “Always too busy being a hero to save yourself, you big dummy.”

He gasps her name, eyes flying open. He hasn’t let himself say her name out loud, not since he said goodbye over her and her father’s makeshift graves. Even the zombies around him seem to have frozen, giving him time to turn around and stare.

She is unmistakably dead. The bite on her shoulder is still there, although it’s more scar than open wound, now. One of her eyes sits strange in its socket, and looking at it Magnus can remember exactly how it felt, to drive the thin blade of his grandfather’s knife through it and into her brain. There’s a ringing in his head, and his limbs don’t feel attached to him anymore. The injured eye is almost entirely red, hardly any iris left. Like any of the zombies he’s seen. But her other eye is still a warm, clear brown, and even though her smile is lopsided now, she’s still the most beautiful person he’s ever seen.

Shortly after the dead started to rise, almost one year ago, Magnus had come home to a house overrun. He’d fought his way through to discover an already-dead father-in-law, and his wife bleeding out on the floor of their bedroom.

She’s begged him to kill her, an apology in her eyes. She didn’t ever want to turn, to have the chance to hurt someone else. She was his world, had been his world since the moment they met. He hadn’t wanted to do it. But he knew, if their positions had been reversed, he would ask for the same.

Magnus Burnsides’ whole world had died in his arms, that day. And now she was here, in front of him, still dead but smiling.

“Magnus,” she says, and he hears it.

“Jules,” he breathes, and thinks that perhaps this is death.

Her eyes flicker over his shoulder, and her grin slips ever so slightly.

“I’ll explain in a moment,” she says, and in the hand not on his shoulder is a large hammer. It’s her favourite one. He had buried her with it. She steps around him and brings it down on the nearest zombie’s head.

Julia had always been strong. She did metalwork, proper smithing. It was how they had met, Magnus hired on as a stuntman and this mountain of a girl stepping up and handing him the sword for the shot. His tongue had felt like lead in his mouth, and when she asked, her voice teasing, if he was a fighter, he had barely managed to get out “a carpenter, actually.”

Julia had always been strong. But never like this.

She is swatting these zombies away, wielding the hammer like it weighs nothing. Heads caving in like eggshells, and when she is finish she turns back to him with a challenge in her eye, like those mornings when they would work out together and then end with arm wrestling. She doesn’t even seem winded.

“Julia,” he says, once more. He remembers Taako laughing off a superstition about magic and threes, but it feels powerful just the same.

She nods, and he’s moving before he has time to think. No more doubts, no wondering as to how this is possible. Magnus rushes in to her arms, picks her up and spins her like they used to do any time one of them was away for longer than a night. She still feels just the same, in his arms. Her skin is colder and when he brushes his fingers over her wrist there’s no heartbeat, but she still fits just the same.

He has so many questions, but they can wait. He holds her in his arms and repeats “I love you, Jules” over and over again until his ears ring with it. They’re both crying, although Julia is managing to do so without tears.

He doesn’t ask, but she tells him anyway, as she holds his hand tight and leads him from the woods.

“There’s ways to come back, if you have the right tools,” she says. “If there’s enough of them left. And if someone alive still remembers you.”

He’d made a habit, over the year since he’d lost her, to devote some time each night to her. He’s never been more thankful of that.

“I never forgot you.”

There’s something almost sad, in her eyes. Just for a moment.

“I know,” she says, and leans over to kiss his cheek. Her lips are cold.

“I saw you jump out off your truck,” she says, as they make it back to the highway. “We were quite a ways behind, but I did see you.” The way she says it makes it sound like they’ll be having a conversation about it later.

“If you knew them.” For all that they often argued, and got on each other’s nerves, they’d grown as tight as any family. Taako, who liked to insist he didn’t care about anything even as he patiently taught Angus how to start a fire. Merle, who played up the weird old man role even as her carefully stitched up every cut, who talked about God like he was an old friend, who could look at the world and still believe. Angus, who carried around a book about a kid cop around like it was a manual, who grew up faster than any kid should have to but still always made sure to mind his Ps and Qs. And then the more recent additions too, Killian and Carey, each strong but stronger together, Carey still so full of playfulness even now, Killian the bravest person he knew. They’d been looking for their friend when they joined them, and they never did find her but no one’s brought up them splitting off to keep looking in months.

“If you knew them,” he repeats. “You’d know it was worth it.”

And Julia nods, and points at a black jeep, someone sitting at the wheel.

“I can understand that.”

The person in the front seat waves out the window, and Julia waves back.

“Kravitz will make sure we catch up to your friends,” she says, and quickly steps in front of him so she can beat him to the door, opening it and gesturing him inside with a little flourish. It’s something they used to do, opening doors and pulling out chairs, some strange mix of chivalry and competition. One of their ways of saying ‘we’re a team, we’re a matched set, we’re in love.’

It’s so familiar, in this unfamiliar world. He looks at her and thinks that for so long he’s been barely treading water, and now he’s finally, finally back on solid ground. Solid ground means he can make a stand here. Solid ground means somewhere he can build.

His dead wife holds the car door open for him, and he kisses her hand as he passes her. Taako would question it, Merle would thank his God. But Magnus… Magnus just holds Julia’s hand, something he never thought he would get to do again. And he doesn’t question and he doesn’t thank. He lets himself exist here, in this moment. No past, no future. He holds his wife’s hands and pulls her in for a kiss and he lets himself believe in this world again, this world and the people in it. He lets his ribcage swell with it, until every beat of his heart strums with purpose.

Magnus is a protector, see. And if he gets a second chance to do right by Julia, by his wife… Well then. Maybe they can earn a second chance for this world, too.


End file.
